Around the world

Friday

Feb 26, 2010 at 10:02 AM

KABUL

Two explosions rocked an area near a hotel in the heart of the Afghan capital Friday, and gunmen opened fire at the site.

Abdul Ghafor Sayedzada, a top investigator for the Kabul police, confirmed the blasts, which occurred near the Kabul City Center, a nine-story shopping area near a hotel that is frequented by Westerners.

A reporter for The Associated Press said gunmen opened fire at the site.

Instead, they want the hundreds of thousands of refugees in this city where barren hillsides and weakened buildings threaten to give way to pack up their tents and tarps and return to destroyed neighborhoods.

People dashed for shelter down streets streaming with runoff from the driving tropical rain. The 20-minute drenching swept trash along roadside gutters, clogging drains and turning depressions into ponds.

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti

A Haitian judge says American missionaries Laura Silsby and Charisa Coulter will remain in jail over the weekend as he awaits more testimony.

Judge Bernard Saint-Vil said he has asked two real estate agents and a pastor from the Dominican Republic to testify in Port-au-Prince about property the missionaries rented to set up an orphanage.

That is expected Monday. If they do not show, Saint-Vil said he still expects to rule next week.

Silsby and Coulter were among 10 Americans detained in Haiti while trying to take 33 kids to the Dominican Republic after the Jan. 12 earthquake.

BRIEFLY ...

l ISLAMABAD - A Pakistani Taliban commander wanted in the deadly 2006 bombing of the U.S. consulate in Karachi was killed in a suspected CIA missile strike in northwest Pakistan, officials said Thursday - the latest blow in a crackdown on militants in the region. Mohammed Qari Zafar was among at least 13 people killed Wednesday when three missiles slammed into a compound and a vehicle in the Dargah Mandi area of the North Waziristan tribal region on the border with Afghanistan, two Pakistani intelligence officials said.

l TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's supreme leader said the opposition has lost its credibility and the right to participate in politics by not accepting the June presidential elections, state TV reported Thursday. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said those that do not accept the vote of the majority of the people and are trying to turn the elections into a weakness for the country should be disqualified from participating in the Islamic system.

l CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico - Mexican authorities said Thursday that gunmen killed a deputy police chief outside an elementary school as his wife, son and other students and parents looked on.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates

Water gushed from a leak in a shark-filled aquarium in a ritzy Dubai mall on Thursday, sending startled shoppers scattering and shutting down nearby shops in one of the city's proudest attractions.

Amateur video footage posted on the Web site of Dubai newspaper Gulf News showed what appeared to be hundreds of gallons of water showering down on the polished tiled floor of the Dubai Mall, which sits in the shadow of the world's tallest tower.

The breach in the 2.6 million gallon tank at the Dubai Mall, open little more than a year, was quickly plugged and caused no harm to the 33,000 fish inside, according to mall owner Emaar Properties. It was not clear when the attraction featuring an "underwater" tunnel would reopen.

Compiled from wire reports

Never miss a story

Choose the plan that's right for you.
Digital access or digital and print delivery.